Catalog Archive

office of student services

Official University Catalog Archive

The Office of Student Services offers you several different ways to search for and through the university's catalogs. The Official University Catalog Archive is an online source for all of the University Catalogs dating back to 1869. Use of the archive is free, and all catalogs are downloadable as several different file types, including .mobi (Kindle) and .epub. For information about conducting advanced searches, you may contact burnsref@bc.edu.

University Catalogs in PDF Format

You may also search for more recent volumes of the University Catalog (back to 1999–2000), which are available for download in PDF format. Adobe Acrobat or another PDF reader is needed to use these files. Reference the PDF search instructions listed below for further information.

Searching the Online Archive

To locate a specific catalog select a volume from the pull down menu located in the Boston College Bulletin (course catalogues) box at the top right-hand side of the web page. Please note that the catalogs are listed in reverse chronological order. A new tab will appear after you make your selection. Several viewing options are available from the View the book box on the left-hand side of the web page. Click on one to choose your preferred format.

To search a specific catalog using the Read Online format enter the desired keyword(s) in the search field in the top toolbar. For a more narrowed search use exact string searches (keywords in quotes) in the search field. Click GO or press enter (PC) or return (MAC). Search results will populate as orange pointers in the bottom toolbar, indicating their location within the text (resembles virtual timeline). Please note that results may take a minute or two to load, depending on the length of the document and the number of instances the keyword(s) appear(s) in the text. Hover the cursor over the pointer, and you will be able to preview the text containing the keyword(s) which are displayed in underlined blue font. Click the pointer to open the page.

To search a specific catalog using the PDF format (Adobe Acrobat) press the ctrl + f keys (PC) or the command + f keys (MAC) to activate the search tool. Enter the desired keyword(s) in the search field at the top and press enter or return. The search term will appear highlighted in blue beginning with the current page or the next closest consecutive page, wherever the term appears first. You may click on the directional arrows within the search tool itself to scan previous or next instances of the term. You may also click enter or return to scan only the next instances of the term.